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Posts tagged ‘Malcolm Gladwell’

What is Your Song?

If you could choose a favorite song – one that speaks to you and transports you elsewhere what would it be? What are the lyrics that resonate in your heart? What melody causes you to stop and listen to the sound causing your toes to tap or your mind to escape for a moment? When you think about it music has the power to change our mood instantly. It has the ability to lighten our mood and put a smile on our face. It has been said that music is a language that is there when normal language is of little use. It’s no wonder that every culture known to man has created their own music.

I remember years ago going to a funeral of a wonderful, gentle spirit who was moving on. She requested that her favorite song be played. The lyrics were written by Lee Ann Womack, the song entitled, ‘I Hope You Dance.’ This song can still stop me in my tracks and momentarily take my breath away as I remember this special person. A few of the lyrics …”Never lose your sense of wonder…never take one single breath for granted…never settle for the path of least resistance…and when you get the choice to sit it out or dance…I hope you dance.” This person fought a valiant 10 year struggle with cancer and was totally bed ridden for a least a year before she passed on. Yet through the lyrics of this song she left us with powerful thoughts of hope, humility, bravery and even joy. The song is about the magnificence of life, the importance of love and choosing to face any fear in our life head on, not allowing ourselves to be cowered by it.

I marvel at both the song writers and musicians who through their talent can emotionally transport us to a different space and time. These individuals have a gift that they have honed through hard work and effort. As Malcolm Gladwell has told us to be an expert at something we must put in about 10,000 hours of effort. When a song can take our breath away we know the lyricist and performer has paid their price in personal time and effort. Maybe their purpose for this lifetime was to try and help us along our way.

No one has the power to take away the music in our soul. As Dr. Wayne Dyer reminds us, “Don’t die with your music still in you.” Each of our lives is like a song, partially written and played, still in the creation stage of possibilities. We are all part of the orchestra of life. We can work together in harmony and feel the happiness in our hearts or like the songwriter or performer continue to rehearse, change, adapt our views through trials and life challenges until we finally get it. When things begin to fall into place in our life – our song – just begins to finally feel right. We feel something deep inside …excitement, assurance and at peace that we are following our chosen path and it moves us to our core. At that point we know we are truly living our life purpose and it is grand.

Have a great few days!

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There’s More to Success than IQ!

We have all known people who are exceptionally intelligent and successful. They seem to succeed at whatever they put their mind to and relish in the hard work it takes to achieve. They have learned about different management strategies such as Six Sigma, JIT (just in time), TRIZ, the list goes on and on. Each year people trained in the newest management or leadership approaches are hired by organizations who are convinced they have finally found the Holy Grail and now their organization will soar. They think they have found people who can make decisions at the speed of electrons. Often they are told by the trainers of these new approaches to hire the best and often what that means are those folks who have graduated from an highly elite institution, maintained high grades and received the best scores on tests such as the SAT OR ACT. Ahhh if it were only that easy. One famous longitudinal study entitled the Terman study followed a group of highly intelligent people – with IQ’s of 135 or above – expecting them to win illustrious awards such as a Pulitzer, MacArthur or similar award in their fields. Most often they did not. As you may have guessed by now …there is more to the story than the latest leadership fad and IQ.

What they discovered over time was that once a person crosses the IQ threshold of 120 there is little relationship between higher intelligence and better performance. (you may want to read that last sentence again since it is so contrary to what we have heard all of our lives!) More recently than the Terman study, Macolm Gladwell who wrote ‘Outliers’ among many other outstanding books found those who won Nobel prizes in Chemistry or Medicine did NOT often go to the top of the rock type of schools. Rather they went to good schools and worked very hard.

The take away for us is that intelligence is a piece of the puzzle but certain character traits and dispositions make even more of the difference for success. Honesty, rigorous thinking about a problem before making a decision, fair-mindedness, discipline, imagination, sensitivity and the ability to see nuances – avoid black or white thinking – and of course, above all, a strong work ethic really fill out the puzzle and create a beautiful landscape of future success for those willing to work for it.

Regardless of how we score on an IQ test these character traits make us successful or not at whatever we pursue in life. The great news is that we can work to develop them on a daily basis!

Have a great few days!

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Badge of Courage, Tenacity and Resiliency

Developing greater resiliency in life is important not only for survival but for a happier, more joyful existence. We may wonder what causes some people to be more confident and unflappable. Have they simply led a charmed life free of pain, sorrow or loss? Probably not. Remember, everyone has their story to tell.

It may appear that their lives seem easier than ours – less traumatic – less burdensome. It is possible that they have had a series of remote misses in their life that did not directly affect them. I have not met many of these types but they do exist and are rare birds indeed. We, on the other hand, may have experienced direct hits or near misses altering our speed and trajectory momentarily. Gladwell talks about near misses and remote misses in his book, ‘David and Goliath.’ He says a near miss leaves you traumatized and a series of remote misses leaves you feeling somewhat invincible.

Another possibility is that these ‘unflappable types’ often remind themselves that 99% of what most people worry about never comes to pass. They may seem to just know, deep down, that everything in life happens for a purpose and that they will survive. They feel confident that will get through the present life altering experience possibly battered and bloodied in the process but otherwise in tact. These folks make it a practice to reflect on their past experiences and challenges to search for the lessons they have learned. As a result they have developed greater confidence and resiliency in handling their tomorrows. You can practically see their three point badge of courage, tenacity and resiliency handed to them from The Universe.

With badge in hand they look to the future not with trepidation but hope for an even better tomorrow. Feeling hopeful and confident does not eliminate the future challenges but allows them an invisible shield of protective armor as they move forward. As each new challenge presents itself in their life, they manage to get through it, reflect on what they have learned and in the process become stronger.

As Gladwell says, ‘We are prone to be afraid of being afraid and the conquering of fear produces exhilaration.’ The next time you are faced with a major life challenge and are unsure of your strength to endure, just remember, this too shall pass and you will be more resilient having lived through it. You will never be the same but will be wiser as you move forward on your life journey. Although we don’t applaud them, adversity and experience are great teachers.

Reflecting on your life you will probably remember at least five major life altering experiences and yet here you are reading this blog. That means you made it through, you survived and you are more resilient than ever! Congratulations!

Have a great few days!

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Choose to Refuse

Malcolm Gladwell has written three books which are studies of human behavior. His book, Blink explained that the way we processing information makes a major difference in our lives. In Tipping Point he studied the way change happens in people and society. His next book, Outliers offered a unique perspective on what makes people successful. In this last book, he stated that it takes 10,000 hours to become an expert at something. That caused me to think about the different areas in which we have become experts in our lives.

When you take this number and think about it on more personal terms, each of us has easily spent over 10,000 hours in study, careers, supporting families, helping others, developing hobbies and, most importantly, creating our own unique perspectives in life. Sometimes the lenses we used to filter our life experiences were clear, giving us an accurate view of our environment and sometimes they were cloudy, effected by events that took our breath away with angst, fear or uncertainty.

Gladwell points out that circumstances surrounding our upbringing make a significant difference in how well we do in this world. I agree but would be quick to add that we all know people who, despite all odds, have become successful, happy, loving human beings. They may have dealt with challenges in life that seemed impossible to overcome, and yet they persevered. They may be a bit battered and weary but refused to give up or become negative or angry. These are the people that when given lemons in life they make lemonade. We know what causes these people to succeed in life while others struggle. It is their strength, courage and optimism that allows them to know that they can handle whatever life throws at them – and they do.

Information is a powerful thing. Once we realize that although our early upbringing, or other life events may have caused us to become ‘experts’ at seeing the glass as half empty we can do something about it. We can CHOOSE to REFUSE to use the excuses, ‘that’s the way I was raised,’ or ‘I can’t do anything about it because…’ and decide to live life fully rather than engage in a life of justifying why we are unhappy. Jim Carrey starred in a movie entitled, Yes Man in 2009 that exemplifies this point. It is worth watching.

We can become experts at living, loving and becoming the person we want to be or experts at regret, anger and fear. It’s a matter of our perspective and the amount of time we are willing to devote to the process. When we hear ourselves thinking negatively we need to consciously redirect our thinking. It takes practice, lots and lots of practice. We could say that we don’t have 10,000 hours of time to practice becoming an ‘expert’ at positive thinking. However, the amount of time left in our life will elapse regardless. The question is how we choose to spend it. What manifests in our lives develops from our thinking. Change our thinking and we change our lives.

Can you just imagine what our world would be like if each of us decided to become experts at making ourselves and our world a happier place? I’ll sign up how about you? Maybe you can pass this blog along to a friend and get them on board. The more people who are engage in the process the quicker the world will change. Let’s make it happen!

Have a great few days!

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